To facilitate hands-free wireless vehicle charging, a vehicle equipped with wireless charging capability communicates with a wireless charging station. Communication is initiated and managed by the vehicle and/or the charging station. Some prior art strategies have the vehicle continuously broadcasting or pinging a communications signal to establish communication with a charging station when the vehicle is within range of the charging station. However, continuous broadcasting or pinging of requests for connections or pairing unnecessarily consumes energy and may expose the vehicle to unauthorized attempts to establish communication with the vehicle (hacking). While vehicle systems that rely on the user to initiate communication with a wireless charging station via a button press or similar operation may be secure, manual initiation of communication is less convenient and does not satisfy the hands-free design intent for wireless vehicle charging.